I watched this last Thursday and I went because of one the guys (Tanaka Hiroki) from Onigiri (review) who I really fell for in that, was doing this and while at first I bought tickets without knowing what it was about, I soon learnt it was abut mutants and kind of dystonia and that my guy would be doing a BL character so NATURALLY I ended up being super excited for it!

Kuryu Mina as Kiko/MashiroUkai Mondou as SagamiSugie Masahiro as Kurosawa KoujiTamagawa Ramu as EvaAkiba Yusuke as Maruko / MarkOguri Ryo as SidManiwa Ryosuke as AlbertoMaikawa Miyako as KokoroMitsuki Saori as UzumiKojima Kotori as Sarubado-ruKinoshita Aya as Kimura ChanelAraki Miyu as Yamashiro MyuraYuuno as Murayama ElmesHiroya as KaosuTanaka Hiroki as AgapeMatsushita Takashi as FiliaMitani Remi as SheilaAino Eri as RisaHanai Madoka as AniesuHagiwara Naruya as ZenelgefMaruyama Raiden as KhanAkaishi Nobu as ZoidAkiyoshi Aya as Young KikoOgura Erika as ShimamuraOba Saki as SallyHanaoka as DoryEnsemble: Hikita Chiharu, Takami Sakiko, Watai RyuyaTanaka Hyoga as Joker

As you can see the cast is huge! xD The stage again (like Onigiri) was small so having such a huge cast was kinda scary. ANYWAY!

Also as soon as the stage started I was SHOCKED to realise it wasn’t just Tanaka Hiroki from Onigiri in this, but two others from Onigiri were ALSO doing this and it made me very happy ^_^

STORY

SOUL FLOWER takes place in world quite like a dystopian where the rich and privileged live in the Three Hills, whereas the rest live in the slums. We follow a community of people who live in one of these slums, and it's called Sector 6, but even they call it 'Trash Town' (gomi no machi) because all the old and broke electronics and stuff the rich society want to throw away ends up being in their area, but it's their home and they love it. Well almost all of them: some would kill and hurt others in order to get a chance to have their barcodes changed (which every person is imprinted on them so the government know who belongs where in society) and be able to move to the Hills. Unfortunately also in this world, we have mutants who are feared and hated by most humans; Sagami is one of them and in order to keep the sector safe, he's locked up. One day, a famous idol singer from the Hills is kidnapped live on a music tv show, who then wakes up in Sector 6 with no memory of who she is.

NON-SPOILER

This was SOOOO good! Oh my! I loved the story, all the characters were (while a lot of them) individual and great! This very much gave me Onigiri feels; not very known actors, doing a very unique and interesting and simple-to-understand story BUT it hits a lot of feels and it’s entertaining in both actor and comedy, there’s never a dull moment, you even want to route for the bad guys! The improvisation was great, the higawari (daily changes to the script) was absolutely hilarious. I enjoyed this so much! And the aftertalk too was a lot of fun! The singing was beautiful too! I literally cannot, I was so impressed and so happy with this stage! And my baby boy Tanaka Hiroki in his cute BL role had all the kisses and stuff so that made me happy ^_^ He’s so cute... Basically, this is a lot of fun and a great world and I enjoyed it a lot!

I went to a play full of people I didn't know last Thursday for the first time in a long time, and it was really nice going in with no expectations, especially after Kuroshitsuji's disappointment (see here) and before Death Note's disappointment (review coming soon)! I really enjoyed myself at this play!! It was so nice just going in blank and enjoying it to it's fullest! I think I'm gunna start taking a step back from 2.5 (which is blowing up at a crazy rate) and start going to these more... niche(?) or at least with less known actors. Same thing happened last Friday but that review will come after this one xD Lets get started shall we!

Jami is also a Youkai but you'll understand why he's not in this Youkai group. Also apparently Jin and possibly Momotarou are demons so there's that too. Anyways! Onto the story:

So apparently the Enemies and the Youkai Protectors are constantly coming to blows because naturally the Enemies want to destroy and kill all the Youkai while the protectors want to save the ones that really aren't a threat. But one day a youkai gets changed into a human and slowly more and more are getting turned into humans and it's all down to the work of Doctor Shubalts. The Protectors friend the Youkai, especially one they end up calling Kisuke BUT the human-turned-youkais begin to have outbursts of rage and attack anyone in their path, naturally Kisuke doesn't want to hurt her new friends so together her and the Portectors try to find the Doctor so they can turn her back into a Youkai. While this is going on the enemy are naturally taking advantaging of this situation and raging around killing all the new turned human-youkai. So the Protectors not only have to find the doctor for the sake of Kisuke but they also have to stop the enemy from attacking Kisuke and other human-turned-youkai as well as try to stop the Doctor from creating anymore youkai-humans that keep going on rampages.

I may have made this sound super confusing but it's actually REALLy simple and I love how simple the plot it yet it ends up being really touching and exciting! Also we get a lot of character backstory -- which really impressed me because it didn't feel like too much was getting thrown at us yet we not only got the main story, but also backstories for Yoshitsune, Tengu, Jami, Jin (a little), Miroku, Momotarou (a little) AND Basara!! How crazy it that! Yet it never felt like too much << that's impressive!

Overall: It was so refreshing going into a play without any expectations, not knowing the story and the cast and just being simply entertained for two hours. It was so much fun! A lot of up and coming actors in this too that I'd like to keep an eye on. The story was simple but touching (I did cry!). I went on filming day luckily and I am DEFINITELY buying the DVD! But dammit I wish I'd had the balls to talk to the actors after the show -__-Rating: 8/10